AQW 33167/22-27

Mr Nick Mathison
Alliance Party
Strangford

Tabled Date: 09/10/2025
Answered On Date: 14/05/2026
Priority Written: Yes

Question:
To ask the Minister of Health to detail the outcome of any discussions with the Regional Procurement Board on the provision of wigs for patients.

Answer:

Discussions on wig provision have been referenced with the Regional Procurement Board as part of wider system updates on procurement pressures. The Board is not a decision‑making forum for individual procurements; decisions on whether to bring forward a procurement project rest with the Health and Social Care Trusts, working with the Business Services Organisation’s Procurement and Logistics Service (PaLS), in line with public procurement requirements.

The Board has been advised that a regional tender launched in 2022 was stood down following legal advice because there was no valid specification and no recognised national or international standards against which the Contract Adjudication Group could evaluate bids; this position has not changed.

The outcome of these Board discussions is that the constraints remain recognised system‑wide: without a robust, regionally consistent specification and an agreed framework for assessing quality and value, a regional tender cannot progress at this time.

My Department is continuing to support Trusts to develop a consistent Regional Specification for wig provision. This work seeks to bring greater alignment and clarity across the region and to generate momentum on an issue for which, regrettably, there is no perfect solution.